Town working to solve myster of unmarked graves at Carver Memorial Park

Bright yellow tape marks off a mysterious area at Carver Memorial Park where four rows, each with at least 20 narrow and evenly spaced elongated plots of dark green grass, stand in stark contrast to the surrounding dried brown grass.

The plots are even more noticeable in the summer when the grass is cut low, said Justin Hill, the town’s cemetery director.

It is a conundrum — the town has yet to uncover any record of who, or if anyone, is buried there.

Hill estimates the area possibly could hold between 80 and 100 grave sites. It was taped off to prevent people from driving over the area, he said.

The few facts known so far are based on anecdotal evidence that the area is where graves were relocated from cemeteries that had to be moved during the widening of U.S. 117 in the 1980s.

The town has been unable to find any official record or newspaper accounts about the graves.

However, that is not preventing leaders from moving ahead with plans to erect a monument in tribute to the unknown people who may be interred there.

Hill, Town Manager Jammie Royall and Commissioner Vicky Darden, in whose district the cemetery rests, were at the cemetery Wednesday, March 8, to examine the area.

“This is where they say the mass grave is, this area,” Royall said. “I have not been able to prove it. You see those spots there? They say those are where the graves are. Again, I have talked to different people from the Department of Transportation and Garris Funeral Home and they don’t remember it.

“From what everybody is saying it was around the early 1980s whenever they widened (U.S.) 117. That is what I know. I talked to a historian for the town, and she said she had not heard that either.”

There are no plans to exhume any bodies — the town does not want to be disrespectful or to disturb the graves, Royall stressed.

“We don’t really need to disturb them. Let then rest,” Hill added.

There aren’t any plans to use ground-penetrating radar to examine the area. However, the town does have equipment used to examine underground pipes that could be utilized.

“So that may be a thing,” Royall said.

The town manager does not know what brought the issue back up.

“When I first took over the cemeteries (in 2021), I noted it, and I started asking around,” Hill said. That included talking to two brothers who were the gravediggers at the time, he added.

“They were the first ones to tell me the story that came from when they widened (U.S.) 117 — an old cemetery before they could widen it,” he said.

They said the remains were not those of slaves, Hill said.

“I was also told we couldn’t sell any sites in this section because it was already full,” Hill added. “That is why we don’t sell any graves here.

“I can’t find anything in the cemetery records we have. I have dug and looked through all sorts of boxes of records that we do have and I can’t find a thing. I am not sure what’s here. I’m not sure how long it has been.”

Royall, who has lived in town for most of his life, does not remember hearing anything about graves being relocated to Carver Memorial Park.

“I don’t want to say yes that there are grave here unless I actually know for a fact that there are,” he asserted. “But not knowing, we will put a monument out here.”

The possibility that the area is a mass grave was discussed Tuesday night, March 7, during a town board work session on ordinances and contracts.

During that session, Town Attorney Carroll Turner said he had spoken with a man who works in what Turner called grave relocation.

The man told Turner he had no proof, but that he was certain they were the graves of slaves.

The man added that where he works “has done plenty of contracts with the state, relocating remains when they are widening a highway.”

“He said, ‘I’m telling you if there is a grave marker there with their name, we move it with the bones and it is placed at the cemetery,’” Turner added. “He said, ‘If you go out there and look, there’s not a single marker out there.’”

Slave cemeteries would have had wooden markers that would have rotted away over time the man told Turner.

“That makes a lot of sense,” Turner said. “Now, that doesn’t prove anything, but I do suggest — I don’t know what in the world you put on a monument, but I just thought I would throw that out.”

Turner said he plans to look at documents at the Wayne County Register of Deeds office to see if there is any record about the widening of U.S. 117.

There should be some record of who purchased the lots, he said.

“Then we could go to them,” Turner said. “I am sure they have a record of where the graves came from.”

Hill reiterated that people are saying DOT paid to have it done.

Royall said he had spoken with local DOT officials who said they do not recall that being the case.

“I guess the important thing from everybody’s perspective is those were people who had lives,” Mayor Pro-tem Steve Wiggins said. “They had loved ones. They had children, parents.

“With them lying there, regardless of where they came from without a marker — just to show respect and to have respect there needs to be something to symbolize that respect.”

If more could be found out, it would be nice to have something put on the monument, Turner added.

Royall said he will begin researching monuments, but that it will be at least the first of the fiscal year (that starts July 1) before anything would be done.

It probably will be July or August since the town will need to get a budget done that could include funding for the monument, he added.

“I would like to put in some cement columns coming into this section and then maybe put a decorative chain around it,” Royall said. “I want it reserved off. We are trying to keep it so people won’t drive all over it.”